Hurricane Charley – August 13, 2004

Not knowing exactly where Charley would make landfall, and aware that a manufactured home is not the place to be during a hurricane, we evacuated our rental home in Port Charlotte Village on Thursday,
Aug. 12th, and stayed with friends near Ft. Myers. We were safe in their conventional, shuttered home, although we did lose electricity and water.

Saturday morning, Aug. 14th, we headed back north, witnessing increasing destruction the closer we got to Port Charlotte. We were told that the eye of the storm passed over Port Charlotte Village, and it was confirmed by the amount of damage to the community. Fortunately, the roof of our rental remained in place, protecting our possessions inside. There were 3 broken windows, a hole in the bedroom wall, the carport was gone, and part of the utility room roof was missing. We were lucky – many of our neighbors were not.

The things we had stored in a storage facility located near Rotonda West were also undamaged, although boats in the adjacent storage yard were blown off their cradles.

We were very relieved when a trip to our house in Rotonda West revealed no damage other than a broken door frame.

Thanks to a very generous friend of a friend we relocated to Sarasota and were able to remain there until our home was completed.

We want to thank our family and many friends for their help and support!